[9] THE BOHUSLAN HERRING FISHERIES. 407 



seveuteeiitli century, and the data given above relative to tlie equipment 

 and labor needed for the two methods under discussion and their re- 

 spectiv^e results, we shall soon find that those persons who have pro- 

 I)osed that the Bohuslan herring fisheries should be conducted on a 

 large scale, with floating-nets instead of with seines, can hardly have 

 understood the full bearing of their proposition, for it is so utterly uu- 

 reasonable that no thoughtful person, acquainted with the circumstances 

 of the case, could ever have made it. 



As it is desirable, however, that the Bohuslan herring-fisheries should 

 be still further developed by the introduction of other apparatus than 

 our common herring-seines, it has, for very good reasons, been proposed 

 to introduce as generally as possible the American purse-seine {snorpvad) 

 as the first step most suitable toward the improvement of our fisheries. 

 This excellent apparatus can be used with equal advantage near the 

 coast and at a distance from it, and for catching different kinds of fish 

 which go in scliools (such as mackerel, herring, and cod) ; while our 

 nets will catcli only fish having a size corresponding to the size of the 

 meshes. 



The purse- seine, which possesses all the good qualities of the other 

 seines, has this additional advantage, that, as it can be used without a 

 lauding place, there is no danger of infringing upon the rights of the 

 owners of the coast or of interfering with other nets. It, moreover, in- 

 sures more certain and better catches, as the valuable inmat herring 

 cannot, as a general rule, be caught to any great extent with our com- 

 mon seines. The assertions that the purse-seine could only be used when 

 the fish are near the surface of the water, and that the quality of the 

 herring caught in it could never be as fine as of those caught in a floating- 

 net, are entirely erroneous, and are mere inventions of the zealous de- 

 fenders of the floating-net. The purse-seine, used at the same time and 

 in the same locality as a floating-net, will catch exactly the same kind of 

 fish, but in a less damaged coudit ion. As regards the rumors spread on 

 the coast of Bohuslan that the use of the purse-seine is to be prohibited, 

 we may state authoritatively that there is no foundation at all for them. 



The question of introducing this excellent apparatus has been raised 

 also in Scotland, and at the suggestion of Mr. Birkbeck, M. P., an Amer- 

 ican fishing schooner is to be hired to sail along the coast of Scotland 

 and instruct the fishermen in the use of the purse-seine. This is done 

 in a country whose fishing industry is acknowledged to be the most ad- 

 vanced of any country. In Sweden, however, a professor of the Acad- 

 emy of Sciences is commissioned to write a treatise recommending the 

 use of the floating-net and condemning the purse-seine, which treatise, 

 based on erroneous information and defective knowledge of the subject, 

 is published in the official journal of the kingdom and thence has made 

 its way through our entire press. 



The purse-seine was introduced into Europe by Mr. Andersen, of 

 Aalesund, Norway, the jSTorwegian commissioner at the Philadelphia Ex- 



